Print options

The Print Options page is the first page of the Advanced Print Wizard (used for both Production and Proof printing in the Designer) and the second page of the print Output Presets wizard.

This page is the most important of both the Advanced Print Wizard and the Output Preset Wizard. All other pages that appear in the Wizard are determined by the selections made on this page.

The options that don't appear in the Output Presets wizard (as noted below), do appear in the Job Presets wizard. Only the Advanced Print Wizard contains all the options, but it cannot save your settings to file like the preset wizards allow.
For more information about print preset files, see Print Presets.

The choices can be broken down as follows.

Printer

  • Model: Use the drop-down to select the printer language that will be generated.

    Connect comes with several bundled print output Models which cover a large range of industry standard print output types.

    These include AFP, IPDS, PCL, PDF, PostScript (including the optimized VIPP and VPS variants) and PPML with a range of quality settings available for each.

    The bundled print output Models do not cater for all types of printers, however. There are simply too many different printers with their own individual (often quirky) settings and capabilities to cater for all of them with just a few standardized print Models.

    To use Connect with a particular printer Model you must obtain a tailored Connect Printer Definition that defines that printer and its capabilities for Connect. For example, to cater for IPDS or AFP printers that support Encapsulated Postscript resources included through an Include Object (IOB) structured field. Such a print output Model would need to be customized for you. These customized Printer Definitions will be created by Upland OL Support, in conjunction with information you provide about both your printer and your specific needs. Support will then provide you with a customized Printer Definition that supports the desired functionality with your specific printer.

    By default, Connect initially displays just a single generic PDF output option, to keep the interface clean. But other print output types can be added to the Printer Model drop-down list at any time via the Import Definitions button.

    The Import Definitions options are:
    • Import Definition: Used to add any customized or tailored Printer Definition that Upland Software, Inc. has prepared for you, specific to your printer.

    • Create Definition from PPD: Used to create your own customized PostScript Printer Model through the printer manufacturer provided PostScript Printer Definition (PPD) file. This option launches the Dynamic PPD Options page later in the Printer Wizard, which allows you to setup the printer.

    • Edit available printers: Add extra Printer Definitions from the selection that come installed with Connect. Adding a printer from this list is probably all you will ever need.

    • Export printer definition from output preset: Use to extract a Printer Definition from a new or modified Printer Model. This option is only available when the Printer Model currently loaded differs from those previously saved or installed.

    For more information on how to add Printer Definitions to Connect, see Adding print output Models to the Print Wizard.

Output options

  • Output Local: Select to have the output created using the local Print Server, instead of the Connect Server (see The Connect server for an explanation).

  • Output Type choices:

    • Prompt for file name: Select to output to a local file on the hard drive. When this option is selected, no other configuration is necessary. A Save As dialog will appear to allow selection of the folder and file name.

    • Directory: Select to output to a local folder on the machine.
      Selecting this will open the Directory Options sub-group, which has these options:

      • Job Output Mask: The name of the file that will output.
        You could write the Job Output Mask directly into this edit box (for a list of available variables see Print output variables), or you could create a Mask via the Options button. This opens the custom dialog: Job Output Mask Dialog .
        The Job Output Mask may contain (dynamic) folder names, for example: ${document.metadata['Country']}\${template}.
        The evaluated value of the Job Output Mask is taken as a path relative to the folder specified by the Job Output Folder (the next option in this dialog). The Job Output Folder must exist, but folders specified in the Job Output Mask will get created if they don't exist.

      • Job Output Folder: The path on the disk where the file is produced. Please note that the folder must exist, or output will fail when produced through the server.

    • LPR Queue: Select to send the print job to an LPR queue. It is assumed that the print technology is supported by the system receiving the LPR job.

      • Local Printer: The IP or host name of the printer or machine where the LPD is installed and will receive

      • Queue Name: The queue name that will accept the job on the LPD. Default is generally "auto".

      • Job Owner Name: Optional entry for adding the name of the job owner.

      • Job Name: The name of the output file. You can use ${template} as a variable for the name of the Designer Template used to generate the output. (See also: Print output variables.)

    • Windows Printer: Select to send the Print Job to a printer queue (note that this is an actual printer queue, not a Workflow Printer Queue).
      For non-PDF output, the job will be first rendered as a PDF before being printed through the Windows driver.

      For PDF output the Adobe Library is used.

      • Windows Printer: Use the drop-down to select the Windows printer queue where the job will be sent.

      • Job Owner Name: Optional entry for adding the name of the job owner.

      • Job Name: The name of the output file. You can use ${template} as a variable for the name of the Designer Template used to generate the output.

      • PDF Rendering Options sub-group (only available for PDF output):

        • Auto-rotate and center: Check to automatically select the page orientation that best matches the content and paper.

        • Choose paper source by page size: Check to use the PDF page size to determine the output tray rather than the page setup option. This option is useful for printing PDFs that contain multiple page sizes on printers that have different-sized output trays.

        • Scale: Chose from one of the following scaling options:

          • None: Select to not scale any page, whether it fits or not.

          • Expand to printable area: Select to expand any page to fit the page area. Pages larger than the paper size are not re-sized.

          • Shrink to printable area: Select to shrink any page to fit the page area. Pages smaller than the paper size are not re-sized.

Production Options

  • Booklet Imposition: Check to tell the printer to generate a booklet for the print output. Booklet options are set in the Booklet Options page.
    This option is unselected by default unless selected in the Designer Print section properties.

  • Imposition: Check to enable Cut & Stack Imposition, which is set in the Imposition options page.

  • Add Inserter marks: Check to enable Inserter mark functionality, which is set in the Inserter options page.

  • Runtime Parameters: select Runtime Parameter Options to store information which can be used at runtime for comparisons against conditions within Job Creation, or for use with external sorting programs.

  • Override Finishing options (not available in Output Presets Wizard): Check to configure custom Finishing options, such as binding.

  • Print virtual stationery: Check to enable virtual stationery in the output.

  • Use grouping (not available in Output Presets Wizard): Check to configure grouping of output into jobs, job segments or document sets. See Grouping options.

  • Include meta data (not available in Output Presets Wizard): Check to add meta data to the output. This can be done at Job, Job Segment, Document, Document Set and Page level. See Meta Data options.

  • Separation: Check to activate the Separation options page of the wizard.

  • Add additional content: Check to activate the Additional Content page of the wizard.

Records

(Not available in Output Presets Wizard.)

  • Record Range: Allows selection of a range of records or a custom selection.
    You can specify individual records separated by semi-colons (;) or ranges using dashes.
    For example: 2;4;6-10 would print pages 2, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10.
  • Apply filtering and sorting to record selection: Check to activate the Data filtering options (to filter out certain records) and Sorting options (to sort the remaining records) pages of the wizard.

Copies

(Not available in Output Presets Wizard.)

  • Copies: Enter the number of copies to print, of each record.

  • Collate: When printing multiple copies you can check this checkbox to have the record copies printed together.
    For example in a three record job the records would print out as 1-1-2-2-3-3, rather than 1-2-3-1-2-3.

Pure Color Thresholds

This section is valid for AFP, IPDS and PCL only. It applies to elements within the record that are shades of grey, rather than black or white.

  • Black Threshold Percentage: The percentage of shading at which the element will appear as full black, rather than dark grey.

  • White Threshold Percentage: The percentage at which the element will appear as full white, rather than light grey.

Advanced Print Wizard navigation options

  • Load button (not available in Output Preset Wizard): Click to select a previously created Output Preset.
    This will change the Advanced Print Options to match the entries contained within the Preset.

  • Preview button (active in Advanced Print Wizard only): Click to launch a Proof Preview window, which displays how the printed output would look based upon the currently chosen selections.

  • Back and Next buttons: Used to navigate back and forth through all the selected options within the Wizard. Up until the Print button is pressed, one can reverse all the way through the wizard to return to the main selection page (the Print options page) and add or remove printing options from the print run.

  • Print button (Advanced Print Wizard only) or Finish button (Output Preset Wizard only):
    Click to produce print output/finalize the Preset according to the current settings.
    This can be done at any point within the Wizard, whether or not all the options selected in the Print options page have been completed or not.

  • Cancel button: Cancels the Print Wizard, without creating any printout.